Are car magazines dead?

[delux]

I grew up in....

Sorry, I'll rephrase that, I left skool and got a job in the early Nineties. It was a golden age for car magazines, Car and Car conversions was still published, Max Power was launched, there were loads!

I owe my interest in old cars to Practical classics, Your classic and Classic and sportscar. I owe my love of messing about with cars in ways a normal car mechanic wouldnt to Kitcar mags, Street machine and Custom car. I've even had questions I wouldnt ask other mechanics answered thanks to Practical mechanicsOther day, I was in the barbers shop where the customer library boasts a big pile of car magazines. Had a leaf thru a recent Practical classics magazine. What a disappointment!Quite a lot of money for a book of classic insurance adverts!

I realise people like me are to blame, as you grow up, Cider, females, tax and morgages impact your finances and the internet didnt exist then so no Autoshite, the blue forum or youtube.

Will the next generation waste time and money keeping old cars going?

Its like when people moan about the high street being empty then going to the Hypermarket then home to browse ebay and amazon!

Still make you a bit sad...

[IronStar]

18 minutes ago, delux said:

 

Will the next generation waste time and money keeping old cars going?

 

New generations are wasting a ton of time and money keeping the old cars going. Manuals are having sales uptick first time in ages. A lot of people watch car YouTube and following things on TikTok and Instagram. 
I’d even argue even more time and money is being spent as owning things like house or a flat seems unobtainium for most of the people, so might as well spend it on something you like. New cars are a bit* naff as well, so plenty of people are choosing cars from the simpler times and making them nicer/better/faster/else. There’s a lot of scene tax that comes with it but, a bunch of people are enjoying random things, not just shining best we had.

As for car magazines, it’s been mostly replaced by online media. However they’re also making a comeback - in my neck of woods biggest car media publisher started Youngtimer magazine, and it’s going strong 3 years later. Annoying number of ads, but if that’s what it takes to keep it alive, so be it.

 

Edit for clarification: I’m turning 30 this year. I know a lot of people my age or younger who are into all sorts of different cars and things, and scene here is shit and state is fairly hostile compared to what I’m seeing in the UK. 

[danthecapriman]

I’ve actually just cancelled my subscription to Practical Classics.

Ive been getting it for years, but just not been too bothered with it lately. Some of them have come through the letter box and never been read. I just decided in the end to save myself the money. 
I can’t say exactly why I don’t bother with it anymore to be honest, but the interest in it just isn’t there enough for me to read it now. I’d rather watch YouTube stuff or read car related stuff on here or elsewhere on the net.

As far as interest in cars and the future is concerned, there will be people who keep doing this sort of hobby. If it’s going to be as popular as it is now I don’t know though. 
Last summer I had a few kids come knock the door asking about the big car they’d seen under the cover on my driveway! They seemed genuinely interested and nice kids so I took the cover off and let them see it, even let them sit in it. 
Chatting to them they were both car fanatics and had been walking to school and seen my car a few times, then got curious enough to come and ask. 
A few days later they came back again as they wanted to see my Capri in the garage!

That kind of proves to me that the interest is still there for some.

[agent]

37 minutes ago, delux said:

Will the next generation waste time and money keeping old cars going?

 

As one of them younguns (19) I can say that me and most of my friends have a shit car or two that we put too much effort into keeping going and we (mostly) love doing so, that part is certainly not dying off and there's still plenty of enthusiasts for this sort of stuff even if they're mostly confined to their own small internet circles now (though the cost of it all is probably a big barrier, we'd all love to own fleets of weird shitters but the space and money you need for that is just not something that's available nowadays). I wouldn't say any of us are here because of magazines either, they were things I remember occasionally seeing when I was much younger but haven't really thought of in years outside of seeing mentions of them around these sorts of circles; everyone on the internet seems to be an ex motor journalist in one way or another anyway.

Everything you need or want for car content you can now find on Youtube or Twitter or Instagram or whatever other latest social media everyone's on now and that seems to take the role of magazines in the modern day, and in reality it feels like it's been that  way for a long while now already. Even for me it was Top Gear and Wheeler Dealers and stuff that got me into it all originally 10-15 years ago instead and nowadays that torch has been passed over to the internet with your Hubnuts and Aging Wheels' and the like for that sort of content, with smaller twitter communities etc filling in the rest of the gaps for automotive content you could ever want. No need to buy a physical slab of paper from the shops when you can watch a man yell at the world's shonkiest mitsubishi van from the comfort of your bedroom instead.

[lesapandre]

E- readers prognosticated the end of physical books - both new and second hand a decade back.

Hasn't happened - books continue to sell well because they have evolved over 1000+ years to be what people like. 

Just a place for e-readers too.

I think there is a place for the well made magazine or paper.

Mag's up to now on the news-stand have had to appeal to new and established readers  at the same time and sell monthly - subsequently they have tended to be a bit obvious  and samey to regular readers. There is still a place for them - but probably not in there current iteration. So better writing and quality.

A good weekly paper is excellent- here in France 'La Vie De L' Auto' is a pleasant read - I would not want it electronically and I don't think they do a version.

And  you can sit out here and read it 😀

[fatharris]

I've seen an issue in Europe of 'Youngtimer' and I'd be very happy to see an English translation version hit the shelves, a guy can dream!

[IronStar]

29 minutes ago, danthecapriman said:

Last summer I had a few kids come knock the door asking about the big car they’d seen under the cover on my driveway! They seemed genuinely interested and nice kids so I took the cover off and let them see it, even let them sit in it. 
Chatting to them they were both car fanatics and had been walking to school and seen my car a few times, then got curious enough to come and ask. 
A few days later they came back again as they wanted to see my Capri in the garage!

That kind of proves to me that the interest is still there for some.

This actually reminds me - some of the kids living in the street where our soon-to-be-defunct workshop is love walking over to us when we’re around and talk cars. 5-6-7 year old. When Saxo VTR was dropped off there, a bunch of kids ran out to see fast* loud blue little car. I’ve also had many encounters where kids were pointing fingers and smiling at the Mini.

Last summer I was asked multiple times by 17-20 year olds fresh out of driving lessons about 159. Two of them followed me in a Punto to catch me at the lights to talk about it. 

 

[EyesWeldedShut]

I bought/subscribed to a pile of different magazines in my 20s and 30s but then moved on as they got 'samey' - no doubt other, younger or newer to the scene, folks then stepped up and took my place? 
There's still a place for decent magazines - they just have to adapt to a fluid audience? YouTube and the like will poach off a few readers but there's also more people with more money to spend on magazine subscriptions than ever? (We used to buy a different magazine each and swap them around)

8 minutes ago, lesapandre said:

La Vie De L' Auto'

Oooh - a sales page https://www.lva-auto.fr/petites-annonces.detail.php?id=301638

[lesapandre]

There are a lot less car ads in La Vie these days but still quite a few - most seem to have been moved online at LeBonCoin.

It's gone from bi-weekly to weekly presumably to boost profits and is a bit less 'contented' by detailed articles these days - as I suppose copy is expensive to produce.

But still a nice read and the events listing are outstanding.

Always some interesting stuff to absorb.

Bit like the anarchic Charlie Hebdo - would not be the same electronically - sitting in a cafe sipping coffee...

[grogee]

1 hour ago, danthecapriman said:

I’ve actually just cancelled my subscription to Practical Classics.

Ive been getting it for years, but just not been too bothered with it lately. Some of them have come through the letter box and never been read. I just decided in the end to save myself the money. 
I can’t say exactly why I don’t bother with it anymore to be honest, but the interest in it just isn’t there enough for me to read it now. I’d rather watch YouTube stuff or read car related stuff on here or elsewhere on the net. 

I think you've given up on PC because you know what they're going to write. There will be a feature on someone that pulled a Marina out of a pond, welded it in their nan's garage using a fag lighter then spent £4000 getting it resprayed. 

Then there will be a couple of pages of tools that they've been sent for free and declare as 'great'. 

There will be a generic guide about an affordable classic which contains generic misinformation skimmed from the owners forums, plus a few soundbites from the forum mod who "knows everything" and is a "guru" because he's owned two and put a new stereo in one of them. 

Letters page: John Boring writes to correct the rivet count on their last article about the Wolsley Hornet. 

Random photos of rusting old hulks (we do it better in here). 

The best bit is the crossword. 

The rest is adverts for insurance and tyres. 

I got out of the journalism game, predicting that paid writing would slowly be pushed out by free hobbyist info, YT, and comic book bot writing about the latest VW Jizzmopper EV (see Auto Express). 

Having done it I now can't read any magazines with any enjoyment, they're all just firelighters now. 

[Bren]

I only buy car mechanics nowadays- even that does not really capture my interest much because of electric cars etc.

[artdjones]

I used to love car magazines.

Car Magazine was great for people who were just interested in cars. There was a bit of a party line on certain cars and subjects, but you didn't have to agree with it. And they liked slow cars as much as fast ones. Then about 20 years ago it became just about fast cars, so I stopped buying.

I liked Classic and Sportscar until I noticed that their main preoccupation was car values. So there were endless articles about sportscars for £10k, etc. Plus some of the writers came across as smug or knowing. I'm sure Mick Walsh isn't a bad chap, but something about his expression is annoying (to me). So I stopped buying that.

The Automobile is probably the only one I'd read now, but it's not sold in newsagents in Ireland, and subs are fairly expensive.

[St.Jude]

I used to buy Car Mechanics and Practical Classics. But after a few issues of both of them, they are very samey. The former had nothing I couldn't see on YouTube, the latter was just all old Fords and Vauxhalls, nothing that really kept my interest. I do keep an eye on the covers as they're right above the Tractor magazine I buy my lad (as he's a toddler and will tear books, so to tear a magazine seems less bad than tearing a book), and there has been nothing on the cover to get me to part with my hard earned.

Only magazine I buy now is Automobilsport. It's a German mag that gets translated in to English every quarter. It's the equivalent of 3 copies of Practical Classics, and while not the same content it's really interesting reading. Bits of motorsport I'd never even heard of. Plus it comes with a big fuck off poster which goes on to my lad's wall. So it's a win win. 

[warren t claim]

Claim_Garage has a few old car mags in the waiting room. I'm not saying that they're old but I was flicking through one and saw a feature about @trigger and his BMW 1602!

[artdjones]

Car Mechanics was good when Peter Simpson edited it. It dropped off later on.

[sierraman]

1 hour ago, Bren said:

I only buy car mechanics nowadays- even that does not really capture my interest much because of electric cars etc.

That’s as bad, very very generic advice on buying. I stopped reading when it became Rover 75 monthly, it was just the same claptrap. 

[warren t claim]

I can't remember the last time I bought a car mag. I do read them at the supermarket while Claim_Bird is doing her shopping.

[AnthonyG]

I read them when people give them to me, or if I find them in the recycling bin (there’s a massive communal paper and cardboard one in my flats).

The only magazine I buy with my actual money now is Private Eye, and even that’s on a sub so is around half the cover price.

I do buy the occasional bunch of ‘vintage’ ones on EBay, I find an ancient copy of Autocar or Motor Trend much more interesting than anything new.

[delux]

Mrs Delux bought me a stack of 'Hot-car' and 'Custom car' from the seventies a few years ago off ebay! They were great! Well written, genuinely interesting cars. Some terrible but hilarious ones too.

Read every one but dunno where they are now...

(...starts trying to remember, maybe the loft...)

[High Jetter]

I subscribed to  Car Mechanics in the 80s, PC now. Am fine with online stuff, but hard copy is good. Enthusiasts need supporr.

[Spiny Norman]

I have shelves full of CAR magazine from about 1966 onwards pretty much unbroken, and Top Gear from first issue to about 2010, but gave up on them when everything they were talking about was either a Porsche 911, a mahoosive SUV or a diseasel of some sort.
I bought Practical Classics for a while but couldn't take any more of the horrid photography or the comedy inaccuracies like the rear engined Renault 12 and front wheel drive Mustangs.
Someone gave me a sub to Octane a couple of years back for Christmas and a few of them were fun but there's still 4 or 5 unopened in a pile.

I'm at the age where I already know everything about the old cars I'm interested in and I'm not interested in new ones so I'll probably never pay my own money for a magazine again.

If I want to read one now, it also means swapping my glasses over.

[somewhatfoolish]

4 hours ago, grogee said:

I got out of the journalism game, predicting that paid writing would slowly be pushed out by free hobbyist info, YT, and comic book bot writing about the latest VW Jizzmopper EV (see Auto Express). 

 

Fuck yeh, not bought a car mag for ~15yrs, better info available on forums and yootoob and in the former case I can share my own ill-informed meanderings and possibly help or hinder. Being a scribe or a publisher/editor must be fucking miserable.

Likewise the only periodical I actually buy is Private Eye on a sub.

[comfortablynumb]

Used to buy hot car religiously, then it became performance car (?) and it was all downhill from there.

Agree totally about PC, I bought a copy for the first time in ages the other day when youngest was in hospital (again) and read the whole thing in about half an hour 😕

[sierraman]

1980’s What Car was pretty good. Please let me know if anyone has a stack to get rid of! 😂

[Split_Pin]

I used to avidly read Popular Classics from cover to cover in the early 1990s. I was giddy with excitement when my mum brought the next issue home from the paper shop.

When that publication died in 1996, Practical Classics took its place but it somehow wasn't the same for me. I kept my subscription until around 2021 but by then I had many unread issues still in their plastic wrapping. John Simister had the stupidity to portray his opinion as fact about folk who don't fix things for a living and I never read it again. 

Realistically, I'd moved onto digital media a long time prior for car stuff. Even that's now past it's prime, in my opinion.

[scaryoldcortina]

Even Matters of Testing got replaced by a blog...

[comfortablynumb]

1 hour ago, Split_Pin said:

I used to avidly read Popular Classics from cover to cover in the early 1990s. I was giddy with excitement when my mum brought the next issue home from the paper shop.

When that publication died in 1996, Practical Classics took its place but it somehow wasn't the same for me. I kept my subscription until around 2021 but by then I had many unread issues still in their plastic wrapping. John Simister had the stupidity to portray his opinion as fact about folk who don't fix things for a living and I never read it again. 

Realistically, I'd moved onto digital media a long time prior for car stuff. Even that's now past it's prime, in my opinion.

John sinister 😱

[bangernomics]

I gave up on practical classics when Holman left. The magazine lurched from something I could relate to and over to the MGB times.


Gzongenflatch
In memory of Phil.

[lesapandre]

I stopped on that one when they changed the paper and coloured photos to some kind of new process and everything seemed a bit blurred. All felt very cheap and nasty. 

Rammed with ads I had no interest in - I know it's revenue but was excessive and not interested.

[Joey spud]

Popular Classics was my go to old car mag in the nineties.

Martin Holder,Nick Larkin and Mark Dixon all had a friendly easygoing writing style and the photography often placed the featured cars in lovely period surroundings. It was more a magazine celebrating driving and enjoying old everyday cars rather than repairing rusted out old shite week in week out.

They merged it with Practical Classics for a while before quietly dropping the pop classics bit from the front cover.

Practical performance car with Will Holman and Kev Leaper was a good read when it first started but eventually got a bit samey every month towards the end. I guess there's only so much you can feature before you start repeating yourself.